Local Justice – Tanasic et al: Taken Away in an Appropriate Manner

Witness Muharem Somic said that two policemen beat him up in his house in September 1995 and took him by car to Vrbanja, Banja Luka.
“They left me at that place and then left, thinking I was dead. I got up and walked back home. As soon as I arrived I noticed that my mother was not there, so I reported it to police. (…) Soon after that the police invited me to conduct an identification. Four persons stood in front of me,” Somic said.
This witness said that he recognised the two men who had beaten him. He pointed to indictees Nenad Tanasic and Tihomir Boroja in the courtroom, saying that they were those persons.
Former policemen Nenad Tanasic and Tihomir Boroja are charged with the murder of Nazifa Somic and the attempted murder of her son Muharem. The indictment, which was filed by the District Prosecution in Banja Luka, alleges that Tanasic and Boroja came to Somic’s house on September 19, 1995, and forcibly took the mother and son out.It further alleges that they beat Muharem and drove him to Vrbanja, Banja Luka, where they dumped him out of the car, thinking he was dead. The Prosecution alleges that Muharem was conscious and heard one of them tell the other: “Shoot”, to which the other responded: “Why do we need to shoot? Don’t you see he is dead?” The indictment alleges that Tanasic and Boroja then returned to Somic’s house, drove Nazifa away in an unknown direction and killed her. Nazifa Somic’s body was found in the Vrbas river canyon in Tijesno village, near Banja Luka on July 25, 1996.
Second Prosecution witness Sekula Sisic said that he fled from Donji Vakuf to Banja Luka in 1995, adding that he had no place to live. Sisic said that he found out that some Muslims lived in the vicinity of the Police Station. He then told Tanasic and Boroja, who were his subordinates in Donji Vakuf, to remove the people from the house, but to do so “in an appropriate manner”.
“While I was standing in front of the Police Station, I saw them peacefully taking the man out and putting him in a car. They did not beat him, but they escorted him peacefully. Later on they came back and drove the woman away too. They told me they had transported them to a refugee centre in Budzak, adding that they treated them in a correct manner,” Sisic said.
When asked by Boroja’s attorney if Sisic knew that he was under an investigation conducted by the State Prosecution for his alleged participation in crimes committed in Donji Vakuf and Knezevo, the witness said that he had “heard about it, but I have not been officially informed”.
Simo Miskic, Commander of the Police Station in Budzak, Banja Luka, testified as the third Prosecution witness at this hearing. He said that no refugee centres existed in Budzak in 1995.
“Bosniaks and Croats gathered inside the auto moto club complex in Budzak for a couple of days in 1992 before they left for Croatia by bus. They were guarded by police,” Miskic said.The trial is due to continue on April 5, 2011.G.O.———————————————————————————————–This article is made possible by the support of the American People through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID.) The contents of this article are the sole responsibility of Balkan investigative reporting network (BIRN) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.